A Brazilian court-appointed expert has determined that Disney's HEVC-encoded video streams infringe upon an IBEX patent. The report also concludes that the patent is non-essential to the HEVC standard because it applies to encoding rather than decoding, potentially allowing IBEX to bypass FRAND licensing obligations.
This finding significantly strengthens the leverage of patent pools like Access Advance against streaming providers. By categorizing encoder-side patents as non-essential, licensors can sidestep the Fair, Reasonable, and Non-Discriminatory (FRAND) obligations that typically cap royalty rates and prevent injunctions. This follows a successful 2025 precedent by InterDigital in Brazil, signaling a shift where streamers face heightened risk for importing standardized bitstreams. If the judge adopts this report, Disney faces potential injunctions or mandatory licensing on terms dictated by the patent holder rather than standard-setting bodies. Operators should watch for the final court ruling in Rio de Janeiro, which will likely set the template for parallel suits against Snap and other regional distributors.
The IBEX litigation is a key component of a broader enforcement strategy by Access Advance’s Video Distribution Pool (VDP). Per Access Advance reporting in July 2026, the pool has significantly expanded its licensor base, recently adding entities like Sharp Corporation, M&K Holdings, and Tagivan. This growth has coincided with the release of an independent economic study by Criterion Economics in March 2026, which aimed to validate the VDP's uniform royalty structure as FRAND-compliant, despite the pool’s frequent reliance on non-essentiality arguments to secure licensing.
Disney has been a primary target for this strategy across multiple jurisdictions. Per Dow Jones Newswires in June 2026, the Unified Patent Court (UPC) awarded InterDigital its first injunction against Disney across 11 European countries for HEVC-related infringement. This followed a landmark 2025 ruling by the 7th Corporate Court in Rio de Janeiro, where a separate court expert used the same "encoder-side" logic to grant InterDigital a preliminary injunction against Disney. That decision, reported by ip fray in September 2025, imposed a fine of roughly US$18,000 per day for non-compliance.
The Brazilian judiciary's reliance on independent experts has turned the region into a critical testing ground for streaming patent theories. Other major platforms are facing similar pressure; per ip fray in March 2026, Dolby Laboratories filed suit against Snap in both the U.S. and Brazil over AV1 and HEVC patents also tied to the Access Advance VDP ecosystem. These cases collectively suggest that the technical distinction between encoding and decoding is becoming the primary mechanism for patent holders to extract higher value from the streaming video delivery chain.
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